


Whiskey Soaked Fears

by nothingeverlost



Series: Storybrooke High [6]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Smut, Teacher-Student Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-27
Updated: 2013-03-27
Packaged: 2017-12-06 16:12:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/737621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nothingeverlost/pseuds/nothingeverlost
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She was pulling away from him, and it hurt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Whiskey Soaked Fears

**Author's Note:**

> Smut, but you have to wade through the angst first. Follow up to the fic 'Outed,' in which Killian Jones, gym teacher, tells Belle that he knows about her and Gold.

He nudged his empty glass forward, when the bartender came back to his end of the bar.

“You’re not driving tonight, are you? Is there someone to pick you up?” the barely of legal age bartender asked as he poured the whiskey. Gold’s third, not that he was counting.

“I’m sure you’re capable of calling me a taxi when I ask for one.” He didn’t want to be sober tonight. Usually when he came to a bar it was with Mal, and his intention was to relax. Normally he wouldn’t bother with a place that had sticky floors and graffiti on the walls, but he wanted the anonymity. He had every intention of getting blinding drunk, enough so that he could pass out and sleep through the night. He hadn’t slept more than a few hours in a row for four nights now. Not since he’d found Belle huddled against his car in the parking lot.

She’d barely told him anything, once he’d gotten her home. All he knew was that someone had told her that they knew about the two of them. A male someone, but that didn’t narrow down the pool, and she wouldn’t tell him more. She wouldn’t talk to him about anything. The three days following she’d left as soon as class was over and didn’t answer her phone. Yesterday she hadn’t come to school at all. He’d never known Belle to miss school, not even when she was sick enough that she had to be sent home.

She was pulling away from him, and it hurt.

“Woman troubles?” There weren’t that many people in the bar, and the boy who had just poured his drink looked like he had no intention of moving on just yet.

“A semester of psych 101 doesn’t make you a therapist, dearie. Come back when you’ve outgrown the acne and need to shave more than once a month.” The damn boy didn’t look more than a few years out of high school. Hell, he could have been his own student, a few years ago. 

“Whatever.” Mercifully Nick was left alone with his drink. He was less lucky to be left alone with his thoughts. Six weeks, since he’d first brought Belle to his house. It didn’t seem like much, but somehow everything had changed and his neatly ordered life was empty without her in it. It was bad enough knowing that in four months she’d be leaving for college. He’d been living with a knot in his gut, fearing that things between them would end then. This was so much worse.

“Poor kid,” the bartender muttered as he refilled Nick’s glass, not making eye contact. 

“She’s not a…” But Nick stopped. This boy didn’t know anything about his life, or Belle, or the fact that she was only eighteen. He had to be talking about something else. Nick turned his head, to look towards the front door. 

He had to be hallucinating. Belle. His Belle, in a black skirt that didn’t reach her knees and a shirt that fell off one shoulder. Far more skin was covered then some of the other women in the bar, but if any man looked at her and didn’t think about how easy it would be to have the shirt off completely with only a sharp tug they were fucking blind. Or distracted by the legs that seems twice as long as usual. He’d seen them naked, had them wrapped around him, but he’d never seen her in heels that added three inches to her height.

“She’s here once a week at least, looking for her old man. He’s a waste of space, but I guess that doesn’t change how you feel about family, huh?” The boy was wiping the bar down, but it was just an excuse to look at the girl. Gold know that look in the boy’s eyes. It was hard not to yank him over the bar and toss him to the ground. “She’s younger than she looks, but as long as she doesn’t order a drink we let it go. Look but don’t touch, you know?”

“Yeah, I know.” He tossed back his drink and stood, slapping enough cash on the bar to cover the drinks. There wasn’t much left over for a tip. Belle hadn’t seen him yet, her way blocked by a man with a beer in one hand and a pool cue in the other. The bastard was daring to touch his Belle.

“She’s eighteen,” he growled, wanting to rip the man’s hand off. He didn’t dare look at Belle, not in that moment when he didn’t know what he would see.

“Just means she can’t drink anything, right sweetheart? We can still have plenty of fun together, and I’m in the mood for a lot of fun tonight.” He licked his lips, and Gold knew it had nothing to do with the beer he was drinking.

“I’m looking for my dad.” She sounded nervous. Nick didn’t want to know if it was the other man or himself that made her feel that way.

“I can play your daddy, little girl. I’ll spoil you rotten, unless you’d rather have a little punishment?” His arm went around her, for just a second, before he was dragged backwards with a hand to the throat. Nick’s hand to his throat, as he pushed him against the wall, was probably not quite as uncomfortable as where he held his cane. The scum deserved to be castrated.

“Touch her again and the only fun you’re going to have for the next six months is when the nurse comes to clean your catheter and empty the bag you piss into. She doesn’t want your kind of fun.” Maybe she deserved better than a miserable bastard twenty-five years older than her, but she certainly deserved better than this piece of trash.

“Nick, he can’t breathe.” Hands, wrapped around his upper arm, tried to shake him; the weight of his whole body was pressing against the other man and he did not move. Flashes of images filled his mind, the real mixed with an unhealthy dose of his imagination; Belle, looking over her shoulder at him while she let her dress fall, but the man she was looking at was a black haired and red faced man whose breath reeked of beer. A smack of flesh against flesh as the same man punished her, leaving her ass red. Thick and calloused hands touching…

“Nick, please, you’re going to kill him. Please.” It was the note of desperation that pulled him away from his nightmares, for just long enough to see that the drunk bastard was flailing and beginning to change colors. Nick stumbled as he took a step backwards without the support of his cane. The other man collapsed to the floor, but at least he was breathing.

“Man, I don’t know what he said but you have to leave. I’m supposed to call the cops if there’s any fighting in here.” The bartender already had a phone in one hand, looking from Nick to the man trying to get off the floor.

“Fucking call them. I don’t care.” He would have left, except that he’d taken three steps towards the door and Belle hadn’t moved. He sure as hell wasn’t going to leave her in the bar. He didn’t want to leave her anywhere.

“We’ll leave,” she said softly, the bartender’s words seeming to spur her into action. She tugged at the blue silk of the shirt until both shoulders were covered, though the material threatened to fall the moment she moved her hands. “You don’t need to call anyone.”

“Belle.” She walked past him, her head down as she left the bar. Even in the best of circumstances he could not run; with four whiskeys in him he was lucky he didn’t fall as he walked. He could only hope she waited for him outside.

“Belle.” The parking lot looked empty. Shit. Two days since he’d seen her, and like an addict in withdrawls he was close to shaking.

“You never come here, Nick.” She was behind him, almost lost in the shadows between the bar and the closed store next to it. “This isn’t your kind of place. I’ve never found you in any of the places dad goes.”

“Sweetheart.” If she’d used his own cane on him she could have not dealt a more painful blow. He knew, perhaps more than anyone else, how much her father’s drinking and emotional abandonment hurt her. The last person in the world he want to remind her of was her father. “I was trying to forget.”

“I’m sorry.” The shirt had already slipped from her shoulder, and for a moment he was transfixed by the pale skin. But then he looked at her, and there were tears shimmering in her blue eyes. “I never wanted to hurt you like this, Nick. I didn’t.”

“Don’t.” A flash of anger bubbled up, the emotions he usually had a better handle on let loose by alcohol and the drunkard inside the bar. He reached for her, but his hand was bunched into a fist and he didn’t dare touch her. “Don’t talk like we’re in the past.”

“This is how it has to be.” She held his gaze until the very end, faltering and looking down. She believe it, but it didn’t make her happy.

That didn’t make him feel any better. “That’s what I thought, when I spent those weeks avoiding you. You showed me how wrong I was, Belle, and you made me promise not to do it again. So why is it alright for you if it’s wrong for me?”

“Maybe I was wrong about the whole thing. Maybe we should go back to…”

“Back to what? You being my student and me fucking Mal because I can’t have you?” She flinched as if he’d struck her. He was just angry enough and drunk enough that he almost didn’t care.

“I need to go find my dad. He’ll be needing a ride home.” She was so still she might have been a statue.

“Tell me that’s what you want, Belle, and I’ll leave you alone. Hell, I’ll write down an A in my gradebook right now and you can walk away from everything.” He didn’t touch her, but his hands against the brick wall on either side of her meant she had no choice but to answer him, unless she wanted to physically push him away. He knew she wouldn’t. “Tell me you don’t want me.”

“Nick.” Her voice broke before she could say more than his name.

“Tell me it’s meant to be over.” It would break him, if she could say it. He’d never loved anyone like this, not in forty-three years, and doubted he ever would again. If she wanted to leave him, though, he would let her walk away; it’s knowing that someone else was behind it that had him fighting to hold on.

“You have to let me do this. Please, Nick, it’s what I have to do.” She was trembling. All he wanted was to hold her against him and rub her back, promising that he would keep her safe from her father, from whoever had her spooked, and from the whole world.

“Four words, Belle, and you can walk away forever.” Because he wanted so much more he only touched her with the barest tip of her finger, raising her chin so she was looking at him. Her face was in shadow, but the streetlight shone on his own and he knew she could see him. “Four words. Four syllables. Just look me in the eye and say ‘I don’t love you’ and you’ll be free.”

And he would be in hell.

Her lips parted and he steeled himself for the worst. All that escaped was a sob before she threw herself at him, clinging to his worn leather jacket, face pressed to his shirt. It was the first time in four days she’d touched him other than trying to stop him from killing a man.

“I know, love. I know.” He inhaled the scent of her, drawing her into his lungs, willing her into her every cell. 

“Your job.” He felt the words against his skin more than he heard them.

“My job can go fuck itself. If it’s a choice of teaching or you there’s no question, Belle.” His job had been all he had, but now that he had her it wasn’t enough, not if he was alone again, and aware of his emptiness. Gold eased her head back and touched his tongue the her lips, tasting the salt. She opened to him, her kiss as desperate as his own, as if both had been starving the last four days. “You’re my heart.”

“He’ll tell if I don’t…”

“I’ll take care of it, Belle. I swear. Just tell me who knows.” She had refused on Tuesday, for reasons he still didn’t understand. 

“I don’t want to talk about him.” She tried to pull away, but he held tight.

“What the hell did he say?” His guts churned. This wasn’t just about someone threatening to tell about their relationship. She didn’t keep things from him; normally she was an open book, even when it made her uncomfortable to speak about things, like her father.

“It doesn’t matter.” Her fingers curled around the back of his neck, stroking the skin just below his hairline. She’d learned how soothed he was to touch there, just as he knew to calm her by rubbing her wrist just to the side of her pulse point. It wasn’t going to work tonight.

“He’s got you almost convinced to throw this away, Belle. It matters.” He wanted to smash his fist into the face of the man. He wanted to watch him crumple like the drunk who had dared touch her.

“He made it sound dirty, like we were fucking because I needed a good grade and you were horny.” She looked like she was gagging on the words. She looked ashamed, and he couldn’t allow that.

“It’s not like that, Belle. You know it’s not like that. I love you.” He was going to shove the bastard’s face into a nest of fire ants for hurting her like this. “You are the cleanest, brightest, best thing that’s ever happened to me. You are a precious gift.”

“I can’t let you get hurt, Nick.” Even in the dim light he could see the tears staining her cheeks.

“The only thing that would hurt me is losing you, Belle. The rest of it we can figure out, but I can’t lose you.” Air was unimportant; all he needed was her. His mouth pressed against hers, drawing her lower lip into his mouth. He ran his tongue over it, the tip brushing against her teeth. 

“It hurts.” Her nails dug into his scalp as she pulled him closer, until she was trapped between the wall of the building and his body. There was barely enough space between them to hear the words.

“My brave girl. You’re not alone, sweetheart. Neither of us are alone, and the rest of the world can’t touch us.” He wouldn’t let them, not as long as he had her, loving him so much that she would rather be alone than hurt him. “I love you.”

“I love you, Nick. I thought if I stayed away…”

“Shhhh…” He kissed her lower lip and the corner of her mouth. His tongue darted out to clean away the tears that had fallen down her cheeks. 

“There are bitter and jealous people in the world, and they can’t stand the idea that something so pure as this can exist. That’s their issue, not ours. We know what this is.” He covered her heart with his hand, the material of her silk shirt so thin he could feel her heat and the beat of her heart. 

“Kiss me, Nick. Please? I’ve missed you.” Her tongue nervously wet her own lower lip.

“Oh sweetheart, I missed you too.” When he kissed her he forgot where they were. He forgot about the man he wanted to grind to dust. All he thought about was the tongue brushing against his own, the lips firm against his and the taste that he had almost lost. He kissed her until he couldn’t breathe, and after a gasp of air he kissed her again. This time his hands wandered, exploring what he had been denied. They skimmed down her sides, the soft silk giving way to the slightly rougher cotton of her skirt. Her very short skirt, he remembered once he found himself touching bare skin. “Fuck.”

“What’s wrong?” She sounded worried, her lip caught under her teeth in the way that so often distracted him in the classroom.

“What the hell are you wearing?” He was panting, both from the lack of oxygen and from a struggle to hold onto his control. Now that the fear had fled he was left with the adrenaline on top of his body’s usual reaction to to her nearness. “This isn’t something I’ve seen you in.”

“I kind of stick out if I go looking for dad in jeans and a t-shirt. Dress the part, you know?” Self consciously she tugged on the shirt again. “Do you hate it?”

“I don’t like knowing you go in places like that wearing it.” He didn’t like her in places like that at all, but he couldn’t forbid her going out to find her father, no matter how much he wanted to, or how little Moe deserved it. To distract himself, his fingers curled around the hem of the skirt, knuckles brushing against the inside of her thigh. “I don’t hate it.”

“I thought about you when I got dressed tonight. I wish I was already twenty-one, and there was nothing anyone could say about us.” Her hand slid over his, pressing against him until all over his knuckles dug into the soft flesh of her thigh.

“There’s always going to be people wondering why someone young and beautiful is with an old…” Her hand covered his mouth. He kissed the fingertips in apology; she hated when he spoke badly of himself. “We should get you home, love.”

“Not yet.” She shifted until her thighs were pressed together, holding his hand firm between them. “I don’t want to stop touching you yet. This might be a dream.”

“You can come home with me.” He hoped she would, no matter what she had to tell her father afterwards about where she had been. He was just as afraid to wake up alone. “I’ll pinch you as many times as you need to be sure you’re not dreaming.”

“I thought I was never going to feel you touching me, Nick. I felt so empty, in so many ways.” Her muscles relaxed, but he did not draw away from her. He moved higher, wanting to reassure her in any way he could. Her panties, when he touched them, were already damp.

“If I could I’d go through my life doing nothing but touching you.” He never felt so alive as when he touched her, even more so when he was inside of her. The world spun, and he didn’t know if it was the alcohol or being allowed to once more touch her so intimately. “I never want to stop.”

“I need you, Nick. I need to feel you.” Her legs spread apart, leaving no doubt about her meaning. He nudged her panties inside, moaning when her heat surrounded his finger.

“I’m right here, love. Always.” With her emotions so strong he knew it wouldn’t take much to bring her to the edge and push her over it.

“Always,” she repeated as she reached for his belt. He shook his head.

“I’m barely staying upright, love. I’d probably kill us both if we tried that.” He did well enough, standing there, but the whole alley tilted when he moved and he didn’t trust his balance.

“Your car,” Belle said, nodding decisively. “The back seat.”

“What?” She wasn’t really suggesting that they have sex in his car, was she? 

“I need this, Nick. To forget everything else and just feel. I have to go find my dad. He’ll be so drunk he won’t notice me leaving again, and I’ll come over to your place but first I think we both need this.” Her hand cupped him through his trousers; the smile that she gave him was the one that made him call her minx. It, more than anything so far, reassured him that she was feeling better. “Don’t we?”

“You’re going to kill me one of these days, Belle.” He let her lead him do the car, and shuddered when she dug into his pocket for the keys. He stumbled once, trying to get into the car and manage his cane at the same time, but she caught him.

“You know what I like about this skirt?” she asked once the doors were closed and locked. The moon was enough that she wasn’t completely in shadow, and he was glad that the parking lot was a small one tucked up behind the bar.

“What?” He was distracted by her hands on his zipper.

“This.” Her knees were on either side of him. Belle looked down as she pulled the skirt up, bunching it around her waist.

“When the fuck did you get rid of your panties?” She was bare from the waist down. His cock twitched at the realization.

“I’d rather know what you’re going to do about it.” Like magic they fell into the old pattern of teasing and smiling, as if the last four days hadn’t happened.

“Going to start here.” There were onto three buttons on the shirt that needed to be undone before it fell open. The front clasp of her bra only needed a twist, too, and then she was all but bare to him. “So damn beautiful.”

“I’m not…”

“Beautiful,” he repeated. “Brilliant, wise, kind, beautiful, and so much more.”

“Nick, I think you’re drunk.” She held onto her shoulders as she lowered herself onto his erection, letting out a breath she’d been holding for days.

“I think you’re everything I want in the world.” She was so tight around him, her heat so inviting. But more than that she was looking at him with a smile. He didn’t care if he did sound like a drunk idiot.

“I don’t want you to lose your job, Nick. But did you mean it?” He wanted to pull her back when she raised herself up, but the friction when she lowered herself again was too perfect.

“When I said I’d choose you?” His hips jerked upwards, driving into her. He needed to be closer, deeper, connected to her in every way. “You matter more than anything Belle.”

“No one’s ever cared about me the most.” Her eyes closed; he could only guess that tears threatened again. Moe French was on his list of people that needed a face in a fire ant hill.

“You’re mine, Belle, forever. And I’m yours.” His hands held onto her hips as she moved faster, and faster again. He was dizzy with the need for release. “Come for me, love.”

“Nick.” She shuddered and collapsed against him, her spasming muscles holding him deep inside as he spent himself inside of her.

“Mine.” He didn’t care that they were in the back of a car in the parking lot. maybe he should, but she loved him and wasn’t leaving him. That and being together was all that mattered.

Now all he needed to do was find out who had hurt her and make them pay.


End file.
